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SOTA c53s01
Text Time passed: the first few days after Luna's recovery were busy ones, where Scrivener dealt with meetings, Celestia dealt with politics, and Twilight Sparkle allowed Selene and some of her demons to run a few tests on her, just to be safe. Others began to filter back to Ponyville, while Aphrodisia moved in with Burning Desire: he was delighted to have her stay and promised to make sure she was able to freely contact her parents, and that Sleipnir and Pinkamena were always welcome to come and stay at his palace any time they pleased. There were two important events for Scrivener and Luna that stood out particularly: one was a visit they made to a lawyer's office, where they found out that all of Ersatz's possessions had been left to him. With the help of some demons, they had cleared out Ersatz's apartment and moved all her things down to Subterra. Ersatz had thanked them again and again for the small act of kindness, and Scrivener had only smiled and shrugged a little. He thought that... she seemed brighter somehow these days, like dying had freed her: but he didn't want to imagine how long she'd been living through hell, spending every day struggling in her own spiderwebs. Shortly after this was the second important thing they had done: Scrivener and Luna and Ersatz had gone up to Canterlot, and walked to the city's outskirts, where a small, private cemetery sat in a quiet little field. Ersatz had winced in surprise when she'd touched the wrought-iron gates and steam had hissed up from her hoof, staggering backwards, and Scrivener had only smiled and said quietly: “You're going to have to be careful, Ersatz. You're... a lot like a spirit made physical. You might look and act like a living mare, but...” “But I'm not. I can eat, but... I'm never truly hungry. I no longer have the needs I once did, but when I touch things... there's a certain numbness.” Ersatz said softly, then she smiled a little. “Except for other living things. I feel their life more and more every day... I fear that I envy them.” “Is that envy, or is that longing? They're very different things.” Scrivener replied softly, and then he pushed the gates open and gestured easily for her to go through, as Ersatz Major nodded thoughtfully and gave him a soft smile. Near the back of this graveyard, in their own little cleared-out area, were five polished, unmarked tombstones. They stood silent and alone, but offerings and gifts and flowers were piled up in front of them all the same. Nameless Graves: a place for ponies to go to visit those who had never been buried, because their bodies had been lost or they had simply never been found. Or in cases like Tia Belle, had never made the transition from the last world to this one. Scrivener had no idea where Tia Belle was. The Vale of Valhalla, Helheim, or maybe she was just... gone. But he liked Ersatz's idea, that this was a place to come to talk to her: that somehow, speaking to these empty graves would pass on their message to his mother, wherever she was. It didn't make sense, but it didn't have to: it just was what it was. The three just sat together in silence for a while, and then Ersatz started to talk, and Scrivener listened to her in quiet. She talked well once she got going: but he already knew that in spite of the drivel she'd written in Rogues And Studs, she was articulate and intelligent... hell, maybe he was underestimating what that 'drivel' had taught her. It might have been bad writing, but it was the perfect kind of bad writing that captured the interests of thousands upon thousands of people. And when Ersatz finished, Scrivener found himself starting to talk as well. Old stories, saying things he'd always wanted to say but never had, forgetting after a while that he was just talking to stone and rock and instead feeling like... there was something else there. It was cathartic. It felt good. And he didn't even realize he had started to cry a little until he was done, and Ersatz gently dabbed away the tears on one side of his face with the edge of her shawl, making him blush a little. It settled both of them: if Ersatz had any misgivings about Scrivener, they were gone now, and Scrivener found himself not just trusting Ersatz, not just accepting her, but actually wanting her around. Seeing her not just as blood family but... family. And he knew she looked at him as the same now, and they had moved past... everything that had happened. Maybe not their own personal traumas, but at least their loathing of each other. Afterward, the three of them had lunch at a little restaurant, and Luna had been surprised when Ersatz had started to hesitantly ask her questions, try and start a conversation with her. But by the time they were back at Subterra, Luna had grudgingly decided to like Ersatz just a little, and that she was interesting. Almost impossible to rattle and frustratingly-sophisticated, but interesting all the same. She also seemed to have quite an honest fondness for Burning Desire... Not long after the visit to the graveyard and putting things to rest, Luna, Scrivener, and Twilight Sparkle had decided it was time to return to Ponyville, and home. Celestia was staying in Canterlot to speak to her frazzled steward, who was apparently all the more stressed because Rosewood had slapped Baroness Caprice and needed to be bailed out of prison. Scrivener was somehow unsurprised to hear about this, while it gave Luna a good laugh: she might find Rosewood loathsome at times, but there were plenty of things about the mouthy unicorn she did like. Even if she also wondered sometimes why it was that Celestia kept Rosewood on as an assistant. The walk back to Ponyville was refreshing, and they were greeted at the library by friends and family... and most important of all, Antares. They looked at each other for a while, but then embraced... and after that, everything was okay. Life continued on, and Ponyville settled with its protectors back and Luna looking strong, despite the strange crystalline horn that stood out of her skull. But for a while, things were peaceful: it was a much-needed time for family and friends to simply sit back, relax, and most importantly, talk and work things out between themselves that had been allowed to sit for too long. Twilight was also dealing with the effects of her pregnancy: while a lot of it was negated by her undead body, her emotions had become a little unstable and it was affecting her magic, among other things. Her stomach was bulging out a little larger, and the Lich was starting to worry about what would happen if her already-stretched flesh started to tear: normally she didn't have to worry about puncturing something alive inside her while applying a graft or stitching a wound closed. These things gave her a few panic attacks over the weeks that followed, but Scrivener and Luna always managed to calm her down and remind her that everything was going to be okay, one way or another. They were going to take care of her, every step of the way, and Luna remarked mildly that at least she wouldn't have to worry about vomiting or other accidents, and she personally thought blood was one of the least disgusting of all the fluids that could come out of the body. Scrivener and Twilight did their best to ignore Luna's advice most of the time, since usually it was either exceptionally disturbing or the opposite of anything a sane pony would recommend. On top of that, Scrivener Blooms remembered all too well when Luna had been pregnant, and how in the aftermath she had spent quite a lot of time flopping around uselessly in the yard, trying to exercise herself back into shape against all sane advice. But Luna and Scrivener were both determined to make this pregnancy as good a time as possible for Twilight Sparkle: with the fact that Thesis still hadn't shown his face, and how they were able to sit down and talk a few things out with Antares and others... things actually seemed promising for once. Scrivener and Luna were rarely from Twilight's side: most of these times were related to Scrivener's dealings with Underbrush or other important ponies he had to try and keep happy, while he sent the profits made from his books straight to Cowlick, who used them to fund projects like the White Matter research. Meadowlark was becoming a more and more frequent sight around their home and the library: not just because of Antares' relationship with the Pegasus, but because she and Scarlet Sage were the only other ponies that Twilight trusted to help her with her condition. Twilight had also passed down a book that Zecora had given them a long time ago to the Pegasus, trusting that she would do much more with it than they had: it was full recipes for tonics and potions of every kind, and Meadowlark had taken it with more gratitude than she could express. Her relationship with Antares was... a little rocky at times, but it was continuing strong. Antares could get self-loathing and self-focused now and then, but she never held it against him, and she was always there to help him when he needed it or asked for it. She was strong in her quiet way, though: even if she put up with a lot from Antares, she had a natural knack for knowing when she had to step in and shake him out of his fugues, and when it was better to simply let him make a mistake and hopefully learn from it. They were good for each other that way. She loved him; she thought she'd loved him since they were foals, really, but it was a love that grew deeper and fonder the more time she spent with him. He was pure and good and strong and kind, even if sometimes he seemed so anxious and uncertain and high-strung... but he had survived a lot in his young life. It was like someone both envied and hated him, and sought to make his life as miserable as possible with the way the glossy-black unicorn was forced to pushed through hardship after hardship... but Meadowlark preferred to think of it a different way. She thought that Antares suffered so much because he was capable of handling that suffering: unlike so many ponies, after all, Antares had never lost that... special spark of goodness, even if he could be childish and made dumb mistakes sometimes. Now, two months after the start of winter, and three months into Twilight's pregnancy, Meadowlark was quietly reading a book in the library. She had promised to go out to Zecora's hut later and help the shaman gather some plants and rare herbs from the depths of the forest, a task that had always terrified her at first. But these days, Meadowlark walked past Bitterweavers without flinching and wasn't afraid to touch the wild Manticores that patrolled around the grotto where Zecora often took her to find the rarest plants. Meadowlark smiled to herself as her eyes lingered on a list of ingredients for a salve, and then she tapped at this thoughtfully before pulling her frayed notebook out of the satchel on the desk and flipping to a bare page, copying down the ingredients into it. Then she paused and tilted her head, before laughing a bit to herself: she was almost out of pages. But that made sense, didn't it? She wasn't just writing for the local paper anymore, she was doing columns for a paper in Canterlot as well, and finally making enough money that she didn't have to accept any 'gifts' from Twilight now and then just to keep herself afloat. She'd always hated the fact that every few weeks, Twilight Sparkle would ask for her help with research on some project or another, which they both knew was really just a ruse so Meadowlark would actually accept the money Twilight offered. Now she was free of that: one day, she might even make enough to find out a way to pay Twilight back for all the help she had given her over the years. She had to travel to and from Canterlot pretty regularly these days, but it wasn't a trip she minded making anymore, and Antares walked with her sometimes. She would go to work, he would go down to Subterra, then they would have a meal and walk back to Ponyville. Long days... but good days. And sometimes Antares was the one who ended up sorer by the end of them... then again, apparently Aphrodisia was being a lot slower to forgive and work her frustrations out with Antares than most of the other ponies. Meadowlark shook her head with a smile, then glanced up as the library door opened and the glossy-black unicorn himself stuck his head inside, a scarf half-wrapped around his neck and a dusting of snow speckling his dark coat. She gazed over at him with warm surprise, saying softly: “Hey, Mir. I was just thinking about you.” “Oh yeah? Then does that mean you have time to go for lunch or something?” Antares asked curiously, and Meadowlark nodded with a smile as the stallion pushed the door the rest of the way open, looking back and forth. “And have you seen my Mom around or anything? No one was at home when I got up, so I figured they'd be here...” “Celestia dropped by a little earlier, but she went back out. Something about Cowlick's lab.” Meadowlark replied with a shrug, and when Antares made a face, the Pegasus gave him an amused look as she swept her things into her bag. “Oh come on, she's not that scary.” “Says you. She's nice to you. She's mean to just about everypony else.” Antares replied mildly as he strode towards the mare, and then he leaned down to kiss her softly, the Pegasus meeting his lips gladly before they parted and smiled at one-another. “Anyway, I guess that's probably where my parents are, then. Okay, that's fine, I'll catch up with them later... for now, let's go get something to eat.” “That sounds good to me.” Meadowlark tossed her satchel on, covering the scarring on her side self-consciously, and then she smiled and tilted her head away as Antares stroked gently under her chin. “Do you have a place in mind?” “Let's just see where our hooves take us.” Antares replied softly, and Meadowlark turned her eyes back up to him before they shared another quick but tender kiss. The two turned, striding out of the library and into the snow-speckled streets of Ponyville, and Meadowlark couldn't help but let her eyes draw over Antares, studying him. Even though it had been months now, even though he had begun to finally settle down and start working through all those anxieties and problems he'd always had, she knew the loss of his wings still bothered him. But even if he couldn't fly, he was still incredibly graceful and agile when he wanted to be. Antares caught her looking, and he smiled a little at her, recognizing the expression on her face as he said softly: “Hey, I'm okay, okay? And it's not all bad, to be honest. I've learned to move a lot faster than I thought I ever could with my hooves alone and... I'm getting better at magic, with Morning Glory working so hard with me. She pushes, but... she gets results. And it's a surprise to see that I've been able to learn so much about how I can improve my speed from her... but then again, it helps that if I don't perform better than her expectations, I get blown up.” “I can't believe your Mom actually lets Morning Glory train you like that. Even if you're an adult, I've seen Luna go off on ponies just for running into you by accident. It's kind of cute.” Meadowlark replied with a smile, testing the waters on what had used to be a sore subject... and to her relief, Antares laughed and shook his head a little, giving her an amused look. “Honestly, I think it's... it's helped us understand each other a little more, you know? I get that my Mom... I understand... you know, that she cares.” Antares stopped and glanced down embarrassedly. “And I get that I've overreacted and been kind of a douche in the past about things. It's a lot better to get coddled a little now and then than it is to get blown up by a fireball or punched in the face. But Mom understands I'm an adult now more these days and... she expects more from me than she used to and it's kind of nice that she will... well, you know, punch me in the face if I start to freak out a little too much.” “You're such a weirdo sometimes, Mir.” Meadowlark said softly, and Antares shrugged amiably before the mare smiled warmly and turned her eyes forwards. “So do you have a new mission or anything to do? Is that why you're looking for your parents?” Antares shook his head. “Nah. All training these days, and I'm still working at the forge with Spike and Sleipnir. Sleipnir's teaching me some... amazing stuff, though. Not just about smithy work, but also about shield combat... I'm starting to get the hang of it, I think, even if I'll probably never be quite as strong as Sleipnir. But I'm a lot better with shields than I am flailing around with swords or spears, and Sleipnir says I just have to keep practicing.” Meadowlark nodded with another smile as the two continued down the street, before they turned in unison down a lesser-traveled side road: they didn't need to speak to communicate, as their bodies moved in a natural rhythm and their instincts spoke to one-another in the language of their movements, the silent speech in their eyes. They walked onwards for a little while, and then Antares asked abruptly: “So what about you, Meadow? How are you doing with things? I mean... I know... well, you know.” “I know.” Meadowlark only shook her head, and then the Pegasus said softly: “I'm happy, though, to be honest. Everything seems to kind of be falling into place in my life, in spite of everything. I'm really happy to be able to help Twilight out, too, with how generous she's always been to me in the past, and I'm glad that we're able to spend so much time together, Antares. I know... we can't really live together yet, but I'm really looking forwards to that day. And I know if things keep going forwards the way they are, I'll actually be able to afford a big enough place and food for us both.” “Hey, I work.” Antares said in an injured tone, and Meadow laughed as the stallion nudged her teasingly. “Also, you know I make a lot more money hammering on metal for a few hours a day than you do for all the articles you write, Meadow.” “Well, I'm sorry that writing is a bit of a higher pursuit than whacking on things with a hammer. And I spend a lot more time doing my writing than you do in the smithy, Antares.” Meadowlark replied with a smile, and the stallion gave her an amused look before the mare nudged him firmly. “Well, it's true! I'm always researching, or writing, or traveling-” “Hey, travel time doesn't count, I do that with you. And most of the places you work don't require you to wear safety gear or put up with getting regularly burned or slapped way too hard on the back by a giant stallion who still doesn't know his own strength.” Antares paused and glanced over his shoulder, adding dryly: “Cannot begin to express how happy I am my back isn't all screwed up anymore, on that note. Having no wings is almost worth it. Except I'm pretty sure I'm going to need to see someone to get my spine put back in its proper place anyway once I'm done working with Sleipnir.” Meadowlark only shook her head in entertainment, and then both ponies turned and headed into a little coffee shop they had begun to frequent in the last while: it was another new, flourishing little business that had recently popped up in Ponyville. Antares had found out about it because apparently they had given Luna several free bags of coffee beans to try and appease her frustrations that yet another business had popped up in 'her little kingdom with nary a consultation!' Not a particularly memorable event by itself, because Luna regularly got cranky when she found out about some new business or family coming to the village she still felt like was personal little sanctuary. What was memorable was Luna tossing several of the coffee beans in her mouth and chewing them up before anyone could stop her, and the howling curses that had followed. It was a nice little business, though: friendly, courteous, warm, and they made nice little sandwiches along with the coffee. Meadowlark and Antares both ordered a toasted daisy sandwich to go, and a cup of hot chocolate for Antares and a small black coffee for Meadow, and the food was served up quickly with smiles: something that Antares noticed was all too often missing in busy places like Canterlot, and one of those little details that always helped him feel like... things were going to be okay. He and Meadowlark left with their paper bag of sandwiches in Meadowlark's pack, and Antares carrying their cups with telekinesis. He sipped every now and then at his hot chocolate, while Meadowlark only gave him a softly-amused look. He was such a strange pony sometimes, but she liked that about him: she just wondered whether or not he knew just how much like Luna he really was, as he tilted his head back and forth with a curse, attempting to lick a splatter of hot chocolate off his nose. Meadowlark laughed, and Antares huffed at her before she leaned in and kissed his nose, making him blink and almost fumble both cups in his telekinetic grip. Then she drew back and strode on ahead, and Antares cleared his throat before he hurried after her, not questioning the sudden affection but instead feeling his heart warm as they made their way towards a pleasant, happy little park, in this pleasant, happy little village. Yeah, Ponyville... Ponyville was where they belonged. Top ↑